Improvement in steam-engines



772i esse s.

N. PETERS, PHOTO-LITHOGRAPHER, WASHINGTON. D C.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.,

IMPROVEMENT IN STEAM-ENGINES.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 23,594, dated April 12, 1859.

To all whom, t may concern:

Be it known that I, EDWARD LYNCH, ofthe city of Washington, in the District of ColumL bla, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Steam-Engines for Driving Propellers; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full and exact description of the same, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, and to the letters and marks thereon.

Itis very important that the engines ofoceansteamers, and particularly of naval Steamers, should be below the water line of the vessel, and should be compactly and conveniently arranged. When it is wished to drive propellers with a high degree of speed, the geared engines must necessarily be resorted to; but whether thefgeared engines or the direct-acting engines be used that arrangement which makes a compact engine and allows of free access to all its parts and of easy and couvenient movement around and about it has always been very desirable.

My improvement is upon the geared engine, and is designed to drive a propeller with high speed.

The invention is one of arrangement of the various parts of an engine in relation to each other by which a very compact and efficient engine of easy access can be placed entirely below the water-line of the vessel. It is more specially designed for naval steamers and for the use of suriace-eondensers, but is applicable to all classes of vessels driven by propellers, and may be used with a jet-condenser, or even as a nou-condensing engine.

Of the drawings forming part of this speciiication, Figure 1 is a transverse section of a vessel near the stern, in which a side view of the engine is had; and Fig. 2 is a top view of the engine.

The first figure shows the various parts of the engine bedded firmly upon the keelson a and sustaining-timbers b, as generally used in supporting engines in oceanvessels. rlhe arrangement will be seen to be made up of two cylinders, c c, of two condensers, (l d, of two air-pumps, the cylinders, condensers, and airpunips having their necessary pipes, chests, and valves, of two eonnecting-rods,ff, of a crank-shalt, g, a driviug-wheel, h, upon the crank-shaft, and of a pinion, li, upon the propeller-shaftj, and which gears into tbe drivingwhcel.

The valve-chests k 7c are shown by the draw ings placed upon the upper side of the cylinders, the chests, as shown, being designed for slide-valves, which could be moved by direct attachment of their rods tothe cross-heads l Z, or by any other convenient means or in any other convenient way. The arrangement, however, allows of the valves being placed by the outer or inner sidesof the cylinders or between the two cylinders, as it also allows of the use of one valve to cover and control all the ports and passages of both cylinders. The arrangement also allows of the use of puppet-valves whose stems would play vertically or otherwise, or of any means for controlling the steam and exhaust which can be used in other engines.

The condenser shown by the drawings is a surfacecondenser, the tubes being used for circulating the water for condensing and the steam surrounding them, and, as will be seen, the condenser is made up of a series of tubes like a letter S-compressed S-each tube being connected to and making joint with the tube-sheets of the condenser only at the ends of the letter; but any surface or the jet-condenser' may be made to form part of my ar rangement.

The pump shown by the drawings isa doubleaeting pump and so connected with the wells or receiving-chambers afiixed to it that at one end it acts upon the condensingwater, while at the other end it acts upon the water of condensation, the partition between the two wells or water-chambers being indicated in Fig. 1 and marked m, the pipe n conveying the water of condensation to the one chamber in communication with that end of the pump acting upon such Water, the delivery-valve of which is marked o and the suctiouvalve o', and a channel in the plate p allowing the passage of the condensing-water to the other end of the pump, the delivery-valve of which is marked q and the suctionfvalve q. The water of condensation will pass from the well o" as feedwater to the boiler by the action of this pump, or by any appropriate feed apparatus, an over- How-pipe from this Well (marked s) conducting the excess to the out or overboard deliverypipe t, this pipe t conducting the condensingwater from the well r into the ocean. Of the other parts shown by the drawings and which have not heretofore been specially named, u indicates the inletpipe of the condensingwater; o, the injection-valve; w, the steampipe; as, the exhaust-pipe, and y the exhaustpipe as it would be arranged when the valve or valves would be between the cylinders.

It will be perceived that the connecting-rod b' is inthe form of a yoke.` By so forming this connecting-rod I am enabled to place the cylinders by the side of each other, their rods running parallel, and have both of the cylinders on the same side of the propeller-shaft. The yoke, it will be noticed, surrounds kthe propeller-shaft and has free and full movement about it. I am also enabled to have abundance of space on the other side of the shaft for the driving-wheel, crank-shaft, and other parts of the engine. The yoke is shown by the drawings as constructed of two pieces, each being attached at its ends to expanded ends of the connecting-rod, which are attached the one to the crank and the other to the crosshead. The object of thus making the yoke is to allow of its being taken apart whenever it may be desirable, as well as to fit it around the propeller-shaft when putting the engine in its place and adapting it to the shaft. vInstead of making the yoke of the two pieces, as here shown, it may be so made that only one of its sides can be detached, or the connectingrod may be so made as to have the yoke at one end open and then by brasses be attached either to the crank -or cross-head, or its form gine-z'. e., if the shaft would have with the direct engine forty revolutions in a minute, with the geared engine it would have ninety revolutions; but the relation of the pinion to the driving-wheel can so be settled as'to give a greater or a less number of revolutions than are here named without requiring any change in the general arrangements of the engine.

Havingthus fully set ont my invention,what I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent. is-

1.,The arrangement of the several parts of the engine in -their relation to each other and to the propeller-shaft, as herein set forth.

2. Constructing the connecting-rod of one of the cranks or cross-heads, in the manner described, so as to allow of its surrounding the propeller-shaft, as herein described.

EDWARD LYNCH.

Witnesses:

T. T. EVERETT, F. S. MYER. 

